Defiance
by DarthRevan2552
Summary: A bold reboot of the Star Fox universe. The galaxy lives in fear under the cruelty of the Human Empire. After over twenty years of oppression, a band of rebels rally together to bring the fight to the Empire. Their leader, Jim Kolyat, is someone who has lost everything to the Empire and will stop at nothing to avenge that which was taken from him.
1. 1: Only The Worst Dreams Come True

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: Before we get started here, I would just like to say two things. One, this is easily the most ambitious project I have ever conceived. Rebooting an entire universe is not an easy task, but I feel like I have done the best I can to incorporate all these characters into a brand new universe of my own creation. I have had this in the works behind the scenes for over a year now, and I feel like it's about time I put this story up here. Secondly, for those of you who have been waiting for an update to Civil War, it's going to be a while before any more of that story gets put up here. I'm sorry, but I'm just stuck with where that story is going to go. Now, I will finish it, it's just going to be on hiatus for a while. But now, with that out of the way, I hope you enjoy the first chapter of Defiance.**

**UPDATE: Went through this again, wrote in some new dialogue and added onto one of the later scenes. Nothing too major, but it is worthy of note to those who may be re-reading this that there's some new stuff.  
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CHAPTER 1

Only The Worst Dreams Come True

_Wherever they went, darkness fell across the landscape. Their massive forms blocked out the sun, casting great shadows over the worlds that they haunted with their presence. And once they reached their destination, they simply stopped, suspended thousands of meters above the surface, only allowing one to wait and guess what their next move will be._

_ And then, a few seconds later, everything goes to hell._

_ The air lights up with streaks of laser fire, like bolts of emerald green lightning rolling across the sky, bringing a premature end to thousands of innocent lives below. All over, everything seems to explode. Chaos and confusion envelop the world. And by the time one regains his bearings, and sees the piles of the dead littering the streets, they are then promptly struck down by the most fearsome force in the galaxy._

* * *

><p>A frightened gasp escaped from Jim's mouth as his eyes snapped open, the sense of unadulterated fear generated from his nightmare wrenching him away from what was a peaceful sleep. For a few moments, the young man simply laid there in his bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. His heart rate had skyrocketed and he was drawing short, shallow breaths, on the borderline of hyperventilation. As he got his breathing under control, he heard the inhabitant of the bed on the other side of the room begin to stir. Jim sat up in his bed and looked over to his adopted brother resting across from him.<p>

Unlike Jim, Fox McCloud was not a human. He was a Vulpid, a sentient being that resembled an anthropomorphic Earthen fox. Like every member of his species, Fox had a thick coat of fur that covered the entirety of his body, a long, bushy tail, a long muzzle and a pair of pointed ears atop his head.

Although there were no lights on in the bedroom, Jim's eyes had adjusted well enough for him to see Fox clearly. The tan fur on the Vulpid's head was disheveled from his tossing and turning and his bright green eyes were wide open. Jim could also make out the dark rings forming underneath Fox's eyes.

The young human almost immediately felt sorry for waking Fox up. He knew how light of a sleeper his adopted brother was and how violent he could get if the wrong person woke him up prematurely.

"Sorry," Jim said sheepishly.

Fox let out a tired groan. "Don't worry, man," he said groggily. "But what woke you up? I haven't seen you snap awake like that in years."

Jim sighed and laid back down in his bed. "Bad dream,"

"How bad?"

A few seconds passed before Jim came up with a response. "Have you ever had one of those dreams where you can't tell it's a dream?" he asked. "Like, a dream where everything seems so real, and you feel like you can't wake up?"

"Yeah, I think so," Fox replied.

"It was one of those,"

"Damn. You gonna be alright?"

"It was just a dream. I'll get over it,"

"Alright, if you say so,"

With that, Fox rolled back over and fell back to sleep. Jim, on the other hand, lay awake staring blankly at the ceiling, pondering the nightmare he had just experienced. The image of the massive figures in the sky had already begun to fade from his mind, but he knew that they were starships of some sort. Where he was in the dream, he couldn't say. All he knew was that it unfolded in a heavily populated area, with hundreds of people being butchered around him.

He shook the gruesome details of the dream out of his head. But he was still confused as to why he had the dream in the first place. The last time he had a nightmare as intense as this was when he was a small child, and he couldn't think of anything that had happened recently to have triggered this one. And just how real the whole thing felt was unsettling. He stayed awake for a few minutes longer, lost in thought, before he finally drifted off to sleep again.

* * *

><p>"Are you gonna sleep all day?"<p>

Jim groaned as he slowly opened his eyes to see who had disturbed him. He blinked the sleep away from his eyes and got a clear view of the tall, grinning Vulpid standing at the foot of his bed.

James McCloud looked an awful lot like his son, Fox. If it weren't for his taller form, more muscular physique and his bright blue eyes, Jim was certain he wouldn't be able to tell the difference between the two.

Jim groaned again and pulled his covers over his head. "Go away, James. It's not even ten-thirty yet."

"Now, is that any way to talk to an adult?" James said playfully.

"If it's you, then yes," Jim responded. "Especially when it's a Saturday morning."

James laughed at the boy's response. "I don't understand why you teenagers think you need to sleep in until noon," he said. "Hell, when I was your age, I was up and about at the crack of dawn. No matter what day of the week it was."

Jim lowered his covers and looked James in the eye. "Yeah, well, humans require eight to ten hours of sleep in order to function properly," he started. "And seeing as how I was up until two in the morning last night doing my homework for the weekend, I'd say that I'm entitled to sleeping until noon." The young human then promptly pulled his covers back up over his face.

"You know, that is a very good point," James said. "But, allow me to retort."

The Vulpid grabbed the boy's covers and yanked them off of his body. Jim yelped in surprise and fell out of his bed and onto the floor, warranting a hearty laugh from James.

"Fourteen-year-olds shouldn't stay up until two in the morning doing something they could do just as easily the next day," The Vulpid said with a smug smile.

Jim sat up on the floor and brushed a lock of his long, silvery white hair out of his face. "Alright, point taken," the boy said, a small grin forming across his face. James gave him a warm smile and offered him a hand. Jim took it and the Vulpid helped him onto his feet.

"My God, you are so much like your father," James said. "You even look just like him. Well, except for your hair. Your old man's was jet-black. If it weren't for that pigment deficiency of yours, you'd be the spitting image of him."

"You never get tired of telling me that, do you?" Jim asked. The young human sighed and looked down to the ground. "I wish I had known him."

"I guarantee that he would be proud of you if he could see you now," James said sincerely. "You're a fine young man, Jim. A bit lazy, but then again, most kids your age are."

Jim looked up at James and smiled at him. The Vulpid smiled back and wrapped his arms around the boy in a friendly embrace, one that Jim almost immediately returned.

"Now, I think it's about time you put some clothes on," James said as he brought himself away from the boy. "And take a shower. Not necessarily in that order, though."

"Um, yeah, right," Jim said awkwardly once he remembered that the only articles of clothing on his body were a pair of short briefs and the bright blue crystal pendant fastened around his neck. James grinned at him and gave him a friendly clap on the shoulder before he turned and walked out of the bedroom, closing the sliding metal door behind him.

Jim smiled as he watched him go. To him, the McClouds were just as much family as his mother was. Back before he was born, around the same time his father died, his mother, Ashlyn Kolyat, had arranged a joint household with the then recently married couple of James and Vixy McCloud, time-weathered friends of the Kolyat family. As a result, when he and Fox were born, the two had been raised by three parent figures. And with his real father long dead, James was the closest thing that Jim had to a father in his life.

The white haired teen turned around and quickly put his bed back together before stepping into the bathroom that conjoined into his and Fox's bedroom. Once he was showered, he styled his snowy hair into his preferred hairdo, swept back behind his ears and parted down the middle. With everything hygienic taken care of, he stepped back into the bedroom and got to work putting together an outfit for the day. After about a minute, he settled on a pair of long, dark pants, a navy blue short-sleeved shirt, and his black and white athletic shoes. Now that he was clean and fully clothed, he made his way out of the bedroom and stepped down the staircase to the ground floor of the house.

The household had congregated in the kitchen. Everyone had taken up a seat around the dining table set in the middle of the fairly spacious room. James was reading through the articles of a holographically projected newspaper, Vixy and Ashlyn were conversing with one another while sipping on cups of coffee, and Fox was finishing off a bowl of cereal.

"Good morning, parentals," Jim said as he stepped into the kitchen. "Morning, Fox." he added with a nod towards his adopted brother.

"Good morning to you, fine sir," Fox replied with a friendly smirk.

"Sleep well, hon?" Ashlyn asked.

"Up until Papa McCloud over there woke me up," Jim replied, not willing to bring up the details of his nightmare from last night.

"If I hadn't woken you up, you would have stayed in bed all day," James chimed in.

"Not true," Jim said as he made his way over to the cabinet next to the refrigerator. He took a quick look inside and grabbed the first edible thing he laid eyes on, a peanut butter-flavored protein bar. "I would have gotten out of bed. It just wouldn't have been until around one o'clock."

James rolled his eyes at him and went back to reading the holo-paper. Jim took a seat next to Fox at the dining table, unwrapped his protein bar, and took a bite out of it.

"So, you gonna come to the firing range with me and Dad today, Jim?" Fox asked.

Jim shook his head. "Nah, I already promised to go over to Fara's and help her with her history project," he replied.

"You mean the one you stayed up all night doing?"

"Yep,"

Fox snorted. "Have fun with that,"

"It won't be that bad," Jim said. "It shouldn't take any more than a couple of hours."

Ashlyn turned her attention to her son, brushing a loose strand of her black hair out of her face. "What time were you planning on heading out?" she asked.

"Fara said I could head over any time once I was up. But, I'm pretty sure she wasn't even expecting me to be out of bed until noon or so," Jim replied, taking another bite from his protein bar once he finished speaking. "I doubt she'll mind if I show up some time around eleven, though. She's a pretty early riser."

"You just be careful on the walk over," Ashlyn said. "Take your holocomm with you. Let me know when you get there and when you're leaving."

Jim let out an exasperated sigh. His mother said the same thing to him every time he decided to go out somewhere. He knew that she was just looking out for him, making sure that nothing bad would happen to him. But was it really too much to ask for to just be able to go somewhere without having to tell someone where you're heading every single step of the way?

"I'll be careful, Mom," the snowy-haired boy said. "I always am."

* * *

><p>Jim spent the next twenty minutes organizing all of his history notes on his computer and dumping the files onto a datapad. Once he had everything together, he started for his bedroom door, but stopped when he noticed that his holocomm wasn't in his pocket. He turned around and grabbed the small, rectangular device off of his nightstand. Upon pressing the lone button on the holocomm's surface, a holographic display flickered into existence across the length of the device. Jim checked to see how much battery life the thing had left. Seventy-five percent. That would do for what he was doing today.<p>

Satisfied that everything was in order, Jim pocketed his holocomm and made his way out of the bedroom and eventually out of the house and into the streets of Korran's Hope, the only city on the planet Forge.

Once a small, backwater colony in the Outer Rim regions of the galaxy, more and more people ended up immigrating to the planet with the intention of living without the strains of being controlled by an interstellar government. As decades went by, Korran's Hope became an entirely self-sufficient city, taking up almost one third of the total land on Forge's surface with it's five sprawling districts; the agricultural, industrial, commercial, residential, and coastal districts.

As Jim walked down the sidewalk towards Fara's home, the calm, homey setting of suburbia melted into the bustling mass of apartment complexes that made up the heart of the residential district. Overhead, hundreds of air-speeders were buzzing between the apartment buildings. The streets on the ground were packed with a diverse group of several species. Everything from humans and green-skinned Draaks, to the fox-like Vulpids and feline Felissians, there was at least one member from every known sentient species living in Korran's Hope.

As he walked, the grisly details of his dream from the previous night began to resurface. He didn't know why, but for some reason, walking down the streets of the residential district brought the repressed images right back to the front of his mind. And now that he thought about it, the streets he was walking down bore a striking resemblance to where he was in his nightmare. The same streets that became littered with corpses in a matter of minutes. But this realization only brought up more questions. Why the hell did he have the dream to begin with? Who would want to attack an isolated world in the Outer Rim like Forge? He wanted to believe that it was just another bad dream that held no meaning, but he simply couldn't shake the idea that the dream was something more than just that.

Jim shook the thoughts of his nightmare out of his head. He took his holocomm out of his pocket and plugged a pair of earbuds into the device before placing the buds in his ears. He scrolled through the holographic menus of the device, opened up the music player and set it to shuffle mode. He didn't care what the thing decided to play. He just wanted something playing in his ears to help take his mind off of his nightmare.

He continued walking for another ten minutes before he finally reached the apartment building where Fara resided. He pulled his earbuds out and pocketed them, but he still held his holocomm in his hand. He made his way into the building and stepped into the lobby elevator. Upon pressing the button for the eighteenth floor, the doors hissed shut and the elevator began its ascent.

While he waited for the elevator to stop, Jim looked down to his holocomm and opened up the messenger app. He sifted through his contacts until he found his mother's name. He selected her and began typing his message into the device. "_I'm almost there. Riding the elevator up to Fara's apartment now._" He hit the "send" button and pocketed the device without waiting for a response.

The elevator came to a complete stop and the doors slid open. Jim stepped out and into the long hallway lined with doors. He made his way down the hall until he reached door 1816 and he knocked loudly on the door three times. A moment later, the dull-gray metal door slid open to reveal the young Vulpid standing on the other side. But unlike the McClouds, Fara Phoenix was from the Fennec subspecies of the Vulpids. She had a thick coat of chestnut colored fur and large, hazel eyes, as well as a pair of almost comically large ears atop her head.

"Hey, Fara," Jim said.

"Oh, hey, Jim," Fara greeted. "I wasn't expecting you to be here until around noon."

"Yeah, well I would still be in bed right now if James hadn't woke me up,"

"Ah, I see. Well, come in," Fara stepped aside to allow the human into her apartment. "My parents are doing some shopping out in the commercial district. They shouldn't be back until about three or so."

"I'll probably be long gone before then," Jim said as he stepped into the apartment's living room. "This project shouldn't take that long to finish up."

* * *

><p>Fara's bedroom was in quite the state of disarray. Her bed was unmade, its covers barely hanging on to the mattress and bed frame. There were several loose tee shirts and pairs of pants laying on the carpeted floor and the parts of her desk that weren't covered with her incomplete history project were littered with empty beverage cans.<p>

"Sorry about the mess," Fara said as she took a seat on her bed.

"It's fine," Jim said. "If it weren't for sharing a room with Fox, my room would probably be just like this."

The Fennec Vulpid gave him a friendly smile. "So, what do you make of what I have so far on my time-line?" she asked.

Jim walked over to her desk and looked over what she had put together so far. It wasn't anything like what he had put together on his computer last night. She was making her project the old fashioned way; with construction paper and glue with several other odds and ends to give the whole thing more visual appeal. He couldn't help but smirk at what she had put together.

"_She always was artsy,_" Jim thought to himself as he appraised her work.

After a few more moments of appraising the project he already noticed several faults in her work. She had taken several smaller slips of paper and had written out the important historical events the project was meant to cover on them. She had laid out these slips onto the main piece of construction paper in what she thought was the proper historical order. Unfortunately, the way she had laid them down wasn't fully correct.

"Did you already glue these slips down?" Jim asked as he turned to face Fara.

She shook her head. "No, I was going to wait until you showed up before I got that far,"

"Good call. A lot of these are out of place. I'm pretty sure that this isn't how the rise of the Empire went down,"

Fara stood up from her bed and strode over to the desk alongside Jim. "Which ones did I get wrong?"

"Well, for starters," Jim began. "The Black Guard was founded three years before the Empire rose to power. They served as the primary militant force for the Federation during the Unification War. And secondly, Directive Two-Two-Five-Seven was executed on the day that the Empire replaced the Federation, not three years later. And I don't even see the founding of the Inquisition on here."

Jim really could go on for much longer. Even before his history class had started studying the rise of the Empire, he was pretty much an expert on the subject. James, who had fought in the Unification War as a mercenary over two decades ago, almost never stopped talking about how the chairman of the old Federation somehow managed to reorganize the Federation into an Empire with him at the throne. The Emperor, a man named Syler Garek, turned the once proud democracy into a harsh Imperial regime, where human interests always came first and aliens were left in the dust. And James wasn't shy of letting everyone know how he despised every fiber of Emperor Garek's being.

Fara smiled at the white-haired human. "You see? This is why I need you here,"

"Do you even pay attention in history?" Jim asked.

"Only half of the time. The other half is spent trying not to make eye contact with Mister Vena,"

Jim couldn't help but laugh at her response. "Why? Is it because he's a space-elf? You do realize that Draaks can't read minds, right?"

"I swear to God, he knows what I'm thinking!" Fara said defensively. "One day in class, the kid sitting next to me wouldn't shut his trap and I started fantasizing about stabbing him with a pencil. Once that thought entered my mind, freaking Mister Vena would not stop staring at me!"

"Were you doing your classwork?"

"Well, no,"

"He was probably trying to intimidate you into actually working in class,"

Fara folded her arms across her chest and turned her gaze from Jim to her desk. "I'm still not convinced," she mumbled.

Jim rolled his eyes at her playfully. "Alright, enough about Mister Space-Elf reading your mind," he said as he gave Fara a friendly clap on the shoulder. "Come on, let's get to work."

The next hour was spent organizing Fara's notes and comparing them to the ones that Jim had taken. Once everything was in order, the two began to apply the notes to the project, placing down the historical events in proper chronological order down the time-line. Fara really only needed Jim there to help her get the events down correctly. Once that was finished, she continued to work on adding onto the project's appearance to make it more visually appealing as opposed to a plain, uninteresting slip of paper with some historical facts glued to it.

"Alright, that should do it," Fara said after half an hour of decorating the time-line. "Thanks for helping me out, Jim."

"Not a problem," Jim replied as shifted from laying down on her bed to sitting upright.

Fara noticed that he was grimacing, albeit ever so slightly. "Are you alright?" she asked. "You look... troubled."

Jim sighed and buried his face in his hands. "It's this damned dream I had last night," he said.

"Bad?"

Jim nodded. "I tried to forget about it, but its been bothering me ever since I left my house to come here,"

"Well, what happened in it?" Fara asked.

"I was standing in the streets. I think it was here in the residential district," Jim started. "There was an entire fleet of starships just sitting above the city. I couldn't make out what they were, but they certainly weren't friendly. After a while, they just started shooting, blasting apart buildings like they were nothing. They were just... slaughtering everything."

Fara gave him a sympathetic look. "This looks like it's really eating you up. Are you gonna be alright?"

"I don't know, Fara," Jim replied. "Last night, I thought I could just forget about it. But, at this point, it's like it's haunting me. I don't even know why the hell I had that dream in the first place, or why it's still stuck in my head."

The human sighed again and stood up from the bed. "Well, I should probably get going," he said. "Don't worry about me, I'll forget about this sooner or later."

"Alright, then. Well, thanks again for - what the hell?" Fara said once she noticed how dark it had gotten in the room. It was almost as if something had just completely blotted out the sun.

Jim's already light skin became even paler, just about any trace of color gone from his face. His piercing blue eyes were wide with fear. "Oh shit," he muttered quietly as he strode over to the window.

"_No, no, no, no, that's not possible,_" he thought frantically as he looked through the window, trying to make out what was happening outside. He couldn't see what was blotting out the sun, but he had a terrible feeling of what it might be. "_That was just a dream. There's no way this could actually be happening!_"

"Can you see what's going on out there?" Fara asked, not making an effort to hide the concern in her voice.

"I'm going outside," Jim said quickly. "I need to be sure that this isn't what I think this is."

"I'll come with you," Fara said as she got up from the chair by her desk. Jim simply nodded and made his way out of the bedroom and back out into the long hallway of the apartment complex.

Once the two had made it to the ground floor, they quickly made their way out of the lobby and into the streets. There was already a massive crowd formed all looking to the sky, everyone wearing the same expression of shock and awe. And once Jim looked up with them, he froze.

There, suspended thousands of meters above Korran's Hope was an entire fleet of delta-shaped star cruisers. Jim recognized them immediately. He had seen images of them in countless holobooks and had heard stories of the deadly payloads they carried with them.

"No," he almost whispered. "No, no, no, no, this is actually happening! This can't be happening!"

"Th-those are..." Fara stammered.

"Imperial Dreadnoughts," Jim finished for her. "Oh my God, it's the Empire!"


	2. 2: Imperial Wrath

CHAPTER 2

Imperial Wrath

Jim was frozen in place. As much as he wanted to run for his life, he couldn't bring himself to move his legs, much less take his gaze off of the Imperial cruisers suspended over the residential district of Korran's Hope. Frightened murmurs of disbelief spread through the crowded streets like a wildfire. Some had already began to run, but a vast majority of the crowd was stuck in place, unable to believe what they were seeing. For a few more seconds, everything was quiet. No one was willing to speak in a tone any louder than a whisper. And then, the cruisers started firing.

Numerous streaks of emerald-green energy were sent burning through the sky from the Imperial cruisers. The cannon bursts impacted against high-rise apartment buildings all throughout the district, blasting apart the upper floors and sending scorching debris falling down to the streets below. Deafening explosions resounded throughout the district as more and more laser blasts from the cruisers met their marks, tearing down what had taken decades to build in a matter of seconds. The hushed murmers of the crowd quickly turned into a frenzy of screams and panicked yells as the crowd dispersed, frantically running in what seemed like a vain attempt to escape the bombardment.

A cannon burst hit the ground about fifty meters from where Jim and Fara were standing. The resulting explosion blew apart the street, leaving nothing but a smoldering crater. The concussive force from the impact knocked the two off their feet and sent them falling to the ground. The explosion filled Jim's ears with a high-pitched, painful ringing, replacing the sounds of panic and destruction. The boy closed his eyes, brought his hands up to his head, and gritted his teeth in an attempt to alleviate the pain. For a few seconds, he just laid there on the ground, waiting for it all to end.

As the ringing in his ears began to subside, the white-haired teen slowly opened his eyes and lowered his hands from his ears. He took a quick look around the immediate area to get an idea of what was happening. Aside from Fara, who was laying face-down a few feet beside him, the crowd had completely dissipated. And once the ringing in his ears was completely gone, he noticed that the cruisers were no longer firing.

Jim rolled over and nudged Fara on the shoulder. "You alright?" he asked her.

The chestnut Vulpid weakly pushed herself up and looked at him. "I-I'm fine," she stuttered. She turned his gazed upward, past the broken, burning high-rises and to the Imperial Dreadnoughts. "Why did they stop firing?"

Jim looked up in time to see just what the Imperials had in store for the city next. Dozens of large, dark objects could be seen falling from the underside of each Dreadnought. As the objects drew themselves closer to the ground, Jim finally recognized what they were; Imperial drop pods.

"Move!" Jim yelled as he brought himself to his feet. "Get to that alleyway! Now!"

Fara quickly pushed herself back onto her feet and sprinted after Jim out of the street and into the alley between a couple of high-rises. About fifteen seconds later, a drop pod landed in the street not far from where the two had been a few moments previously. The sides of the pod blew off, and an entire squad of human soldiers, all clad from head to toe in matte-black combat armor, filed out of the pod and into the street, blaster rifles primed and at the ready. These men were assault troopers of the Black Guard.

Comprised entirely of human soldiers, the Black Guard once served the old Federation as the primary military force. Now they ruthlessly enforce the Imperial regime and serve as a symbol of the absolute power that the Empire holds over the galaxy. Aside from the glowing red T-shaped visors on their helmets and the crimson, eight-pointed Imperial Star painted on their shoulder pads, the thick plating of the assault troopers' armor was completely black. Each trooper also wielded an Imperial DL-14 blaster rifle, an assault weapon that fired blaster bolts powerful enough to completely penetrate most suits of combat armor. And now, these troopers were filling the streets of Korran's Hope.

Jim quietly cursed to himself as he and Fara both scrambled behind one of the high-rises to avoid being spotted.

"Oh my God," Fara whimpered. "W-we need to get out of here, Jim!"

"Mom," Jim almost whispered. "She's still back at the house. I-I need to see if she's alright!"

"It's too risky!" Fara protested. "If you go out into the streets, you're as good as dead!"

"That's why I won't take the streets!" Jim countered. "These alleys continue all the way back to the suburbs. If I move quickly enough, I can make it back to my house without being seen," The ground shuddered as more drop pods landed in the street, nearly causing Jim to lose his balance and fall to the ground. "I'm going back to the suburbs! I am _not _leaving this city without my mother!" With that, the boy took off in a full sprint down the alley.

"Jim, wait!" Fara called as she ran after the white-haired human.

Jim ran faster than he had ever run in his life, weaving his way through the residential district's vast network of alleyways. His chest was on fire and his legs felt like they were about to fall off. But he kept on running in an effort to avoid the Imperial troops that were now filling the city streets, gunning down everything they came across. As he ran, there were several instances where he could hear cries for mercy from people in the streets, only to be promptly cut short by a quick burst of blaster fire a second later.

"_I've gotta get to her before they do,_" the boy frantically thought to himself. "_I need to make sure that she's alright!_"

After a few minutes of prolonged running, Jim finally made it out of the maze of alleyways and back into the suburbs. Or, more accurately, what was left of the suburbs. The once tranquil, green hillside was now scarred with large, smoking craters. And the numerous homes that dotted the landscape had been reduced to nothing more than rubble.

"This can't be happening," Jim quietly muttered to himself. "This can't be happening!"

Fara had finally caught up to the white-haired human and was panting heavily. "Jim, please! We need to get out of the city _now_!" she pleaded.

"No! She has to be here somewhere!" Jim protested as he scanned the wreckage for any trace of his mother. A few seconds passed before he found her, pinned underneath the pile of debris that used to be his home. She was still alive.

Jim's heart rate skyrocketed as he broke into a sprint to the ruined house, Fara following in tow. "Mom!" the boy shouted. "Mom! I'm coming!"

Ashlyn slowly opened her eyes, using her left hand to brush her jet-black hair out of her face to see the two figures quickly approaching her. "Jim?" she said weakly. "Jim? Fara?"

The human and the Vulpid reached the wreckage of the house and knelt down next to Ashlyn. "Fara, start moving as much of this debris as you can!" Jim shouted as he started to furiously dig through the remains of the house. Fara nodded and then quickly followed suit.

"It's the Empire, isn't it?" Ashlyn asked. "Why the hell aren't you two running? You need to get out of here!"

"I want to run more than anything!" Jim shouted. "But I'm not going anywhere until you're back on your feet!"

Ashlyn reached out and grabbed her son's wrist, turning the boy's full attention to his mother. "Sweetheart, listen to me," she said as calmly as she could. "One of the house's support beams fractured my spine. Even if you could get me out, I would only slow you down. You need to leave me behind."

"Screw that! I don't care if I have to carry you out of Korran's Hope! I am _not_ leaving you here!" Jim yelled, yanking his wrist away from his mother and continuing to dig her out. But he stopped when the ground violently shuddered. Jim looked up from the debris and froze once he saw what had landed about seventy meters down the street.

It was a drop pod, only much bigger than the ones that delivered the Black Guard troopers to the city streets. Before he even started wondering what was inside it, the pod's sides blew off and revealed its cargo.

Out from the pod stepped an Imperial Strider, a towering ten meter tall machine of war. Its design was reminiscent of a giant, metal spider. A large body being held up by four heavily armored legs that ended in flat, rectangular feet. At the front of the body was the cockpit, a large head-like structure with a circular, red-tinted canopy, like a giant bloodshot eye. Mounted beneath the "head" were the Strider's main weapons, two heavy blaster cannons and a single repeating blaster for dealing with infantry in close quarters. But all of that paled in comparison to what was riding atop the Strider.

A tall figure, clad entirely in black and red. His skin was unnaturally pale, as if he had never spent a day of his life outside. His long, black hair was swept back behind his ears, leaving his sulfuric yellow eyes and calm smile completely unobscured. Jim knew exactly who he was. He had seen this man numerous times in history books and holo-vids. He only wished that it was somebody else. Anybody else would be better than the person riding the strider towards them.

"The Emperor," Jim whispered shakily. Realizing the danger that they were in, he snapped out of his fearful trance and looked over to Fara. "Hurry up, dammit!"

"I'm trying!" Fara whimpered, tears beginning to form in her eyes.

Ashlyn maintained her sense of calm and looked her son right in the eyes. "Do you want all three of us to die?" she asked quietly. She looked away from him and her eyes grew wide when she saw someone else running up from behind her son. It was another Vulpid. "James!" she gasped.

James McCloud stepped up alongside Jim and knelt down in front of Ashlyn. "I started running here as soon as I saw the pods begin to drop," he said. He opened his muzzle to speak again, but Ashlyn cut him off.

"James, are Fox and Vixy safe?" she asked.

James nodded. "Yeah, they're waiting for us at the starpad," he said.

"Then take the kids and go, now!" Ashlyn pleaded.

James's eyes opened as wide as they could go and his muzzle dropped. "But Ash, what abo-"

"For Christ's sake, you'll never get me out in time!" Ashlyn shouted, finally breaking her calm facade. "Get the kids out of here NOW!"

James struggled for a few seconds, trying to figure out what to do. But in the end, he simply nodded. He quickly stood up and wrapped his left arm around Jim's gut, hoisting the boy up onto his shoulder in a fireman's carry.

"James, what the hell are you doing?!" Jim yelled as the Vulpid moved to take hold of Fara. "Put me down! Mom's still trapped! I can't leave her!"

Ignoring the boy's struggles, James looked back at Ashlyn. "Ash, are you sure?" he asked.

"Just go! Get the hell out of here, McCloud!" Ashlyn shouted at the Vulpid. James swallowed heavily and then quickly nodded. He turned around and sprinted away from the wreckage of the house, making a bee line straight for the civilian starpads on the outskirts of the city.

From atop James's shoulder, all Jim could do was watch as the Strider closed the distance between it and the pile of debris his mother was stuck under. Once it came within two meters, the Strider came to a halt. The Emperor extended one of his hands towards the wreckage and, almost instantaneously, the debris was blasted away, leaving Ashlyn completely exposed.

The Emperor then hopped down from atop the Strider and stepped towards the woman laying on the ground, grabbing her by the face and sitting her up on her knees. She struggled in his grasp and promptly spat in his face when he leaned in close enough to her. His response was a backhanded slap across her face, sending her back to the ground.

Calmly and collectively, the Emperor wiped his face clean and reached for an object clipped onto his belt. He wrapped his fingers around the silver, hilt-like device and thumbed a small button near the thing's pommel, causing a meter long blade of crimson energy to materialize from the hilt.

Jim's eyes were nearly bulging out of his head. He had no idea what the hell kind of a weapon the Emperor was using, but he knew exactly what he was going to do with it. "Stop! Leave her alone, you bastard!" Jim yelled over James's shoulder. But his demands fell upon deaf ears. The Emperor raised his blade above his head and swiftly brought it down, slashing clean through Ashlyn's neck. Her whole body went limp as her head rolled off of her neck.

"MOM!" Jim cried in anguish. "NO! No, no, no, no, no, God dammit, no!" he continued to shout as James sprinted away from the carnage with the young human on his shoulder and the weeping Fennec Vulpid tucked under his arm.

* * *

><p>Dead. That was how he felt. It was difficult for Jim to feel anything after what he had just witnessed. His home, reduced to rubble. His mother, murdered right in front of him. Everything he had ever known, destroyed. He didn't know how long he had been laying on James's shoulder, but it felt like hours. The suburbs were now long out of sight. They must have been near the outskirts of Korran's Hope, because Jim had a complete view of the burning ruins of the city.<p>

All that Jim could think about were the final moments he spent with his mother. He never got to say goodbye. He never got to tell her that he loved her. All he did was yell at her. Yelling that he was going to save her, no matter what it took.

If James hadn't come along, he and Fara may have been able to dig her out of the rubble. They may have been able to saver her from the Emperor. He wanted to blame James for what happened, but he couldn't bring himself to. The Vulpid saved his life, and he would have made an attempt to rescue his mother as well. No, the only person there was to blame for his mother's death was the Emperor himself.

James let go of Fara and lowered Jim from his shoulder. He knelt down in front of the boy and rested both of his hands on his shoulders. "I'm sorry," the Vulpid said, his voice stricken with sorrow. "I'm so sorry."

Jim didn't say anything in response, simply looking to the ground with the same, deadened expression that he had been wearing since they had fled the suburbs.

James stood back up. "Come on. The starpad is just up here," he said.

The three walked in silence until they reached the starpad, a massive, rectangular plot of land separated into over a hundred different landing zones for small to medium sized starcraft. Right now, only a couple of the landing zones had ships occupying them, one of which belonged to the McClouds.

The _Outrider _was an old _Endurance_-class freighter. It was a craft of decent size, capable of holding a family of five as well as several hundred kilograms of cargo within its disc-shaped hull. It was also modestly armed (as far as civilian craft went). Two blaster cannons mounted on either side of the ship, as well as dorsal and ventral blaster turrets. At the boarding ramp of the ship stood three figures. Jim instantly recognized Fox and Vixy, but it took him a few seconds to see that the third person was Fara's mother, Jaina Phoenix.

"Fara!" Jaina called when she saw her daughter. Fara's ears perked up and she broke into a full run towards her mother, wrapping her arms around her in a strong embrace once she reached her.

The two held on to each other for about half a minute. When they finally came apart, Jaina still held both hands onto Fara's shoulders. "Where's Dad?" Fara asked.

The older Fennec didn't say anything, but the sorrowful expression she wore answered Fara's question all the same; her father didn't make it.

Fara's large ears drooped down and her muzzle dropped. She buried her face in her mother's shoulder and wept, and Jaina wrapped her arms around her daughter in a comforting embrace. James and Jim left Fara with her mother and stepped towards the _Outrider_.

"Boys, get aboard," James said. Jim didn't need to be told twice, as he quietly nodded and marched up the boarding ramp, his head hanging low the whole way. Fox, on the other hand, stayed put, eyes locked on his father.

"Dad, what's wrong with Jim?" Fox asked.

"And where's Ash?" Vixy added.

"Ash didn't make it," James said solemnly. "I'll explain it later. We need to leave Forge _now_." he added once he saw his family's shocked expressions. Fox and Vixy both nodded and hurried up the boarding ramp and into the _Outrider_, James following in tow.

* * *

><p>Less than ten minutes later, the <em>Outrider <em>had taken off and was speeding through Forge's atmosphere. James didn't lay off on the throttle until he was certain that they were well out of range of the Imperial's sensors. Once he was sure they were safe, he angled the ship upwards and began the ascent out of the atmosphere and into space. He continued to fly along a straight path away from the planet until they made it out of Forge's gravity well. There was only one more step remaining before they were out of the woods for good. They needed a place to stay. Somewhere far outside of the jurisdiction of the Empire. After a few seconds, he came up with just the right place.

James looked to his navigation console and punched in the coordinates for Vulpes, the Vulpid homeworld. It was deep in the Outer Rim, thousands of lightyears from any Imperial bases. It would suit their needs perfectly.

With all the preparations made, James initiated the jump to lightspeed. The stars outside of the main viewport began to smear and elongate before the entire ship lurched forward, and all the stars were replaced by the spinning blue tunnel of warp-space.

James let out a deep sigh and leaned back in the pilot's chair. Next to him, Vixy sat up from the copilot's. "Where are you off to?" James asked his wife.

"I'm going to check on Jim," she said. "You should come, too."

"I-I can't," James said. "I can hardly look him in the eye as it is. It's my fault that his mom died."

"That's not true, James," Vixy said. "The bastard who killed Ash is the one at fault, not you." With that, she spun on her heel and stepped out of the cockpit, making her way to the aft crew quarters.

The metal door to the crew quarters slid open and revealed Jim sitting on one of the beds, staring blankly at the floor. Vixy slowly stepped into the room. "Jim?" she said quietly. The boy looked up at her. Tears were beginning to form in his bright blue eyes.

Vixy strode over to the bed and sat down next to him. She placed one her hands on his shoulder.

"I can't believe she's gone," Jim whispered. "I never got to say goodbye. And now she's just... she's just gone. I'm never going to see her again." the boy got more and more choked up as he spoke until he finally broke down. He turned to Vixy and wrapped his arms around her, burying his face in her shoulder, weeping. The ginger-furred Vulpid returned his embrace and held him close in an attempt to comfort him.

It must have been at least five or seven minutes before the two came apart. "You must be exhausted," Vixy said softly. "Try to get some sleep. I'm heading back up to the cockpit."

Jim nodded quietly in response and Vixy stood up from the bed and strode out of the room. The door slid shut behind her, leaving him alone. The boy wiped the tears from his face and kicked off his shoes. He then crawled into the bed's covers, but he couldn't fall asleep. He simply laid there, starting blankly at the ceiling panels. He replayed the events of the day in his head, particularly his escape from the city, and his final moments with his mother.

"_I'm never going to see her again,_" he thought to himself. "_All because of him. All because of the Emperor. He took everything from me._"


	3. 3: Five Years

CHAPTER 3

Five Years

"Hey. Wake up, lazybones," the young human said as he playfully nudged the sleeping Vulpid sitting in front of him.

Fara groaned and looked over her shoulder. "You wanna stop, Jim?" she asked irritably. "I hardly got any sleep last night. I'm tired as all hell."

Jim rose his hands up defensively. "Just looking out for you," he said with a smirk. "You know Vena hates it when you sleep in his class. I doubt he'll be pleased if he sees you taking a nap in here for the third time this week."

Fara glared at him with tired eyes. "I can look after my own pelt, thanks," she said before turning around and planting her face against her desk.

Jim simply shrugged at her as he leaned back in his seat. A few moments later, the sliding metal door to the class room slid open and the tall figure of Mister Vena stepped in, silencing the class's chatter.

Vena was a Draak, a tall, slender sentient with light green skin. Like all other Draaks, he bore a great resemblance to the elves of human high-fantasy. He had long, pointed ears, extremely sharp and angular facial features, and high-arching eyebrows. His jet-black hair was receding from the lateral sides of his forehead and his violet eyes were almost always open, rarely ever blinking.

"Alright, class, let's not waste any time," Vena said as he stepped further into the room. "Open up your textbooks to page three-hundred and fourteen. We're starting our unit on the Unification War."

The class complied, and twenty-two holo-books were switched on. The twenty-third book, which belonged to Fara, stayed switched off.

Vena sighed and strode over to the sleeping Vulpid near the back of the room. He slammed his hand against Fara's desk and she let out a yelp as she snapped awake.

"Wake up, Miss Phoenix," Vena said calmly, but his impatience was clearly visible in his eyes.

"Sorry, sir," Fara said quickly. "It's just that-"

"If you feel that you aren't getting enough sleep at night, then perhaps you should consider going to bed earlier," Vena said. "Now, I will not ask again. Open your book to page three-hundred and fourteen."

"Yes, sir," Fara sighed as she switched on her holo-book and navigated to the proper page.

"Now, then," Vena started as he made his way back to the front of the room. "Before we begin, does anyone in here know how the Unification War began?"

Nobody raised their hands, save for the white-haired human in the back of the room.

"Mister Kolyat, tell us what you know,"

Jim cleared his throat before he spoke. "The Unification War started when a number of star systems seceded from the Galactic Federation and formed the Separatist Coalition," he started. "The Coalition had some pretty valuable resources on their side. Bankers, traders, weapons manufacturers, you name it. So, naturally, the Federation didn't want to lose these resources. As time went on, tensions between the two kept on building until it finally escalated into war."

"A fine display of knowledge, Mister Kolyat," Vena praised. "Yes, the Unification War was triggered by the Federation's attempts to reunify the separatist systems. Hence, the name of the war. Now, then, begin reading through the first section and we shall reconvene in twenty minutes to review. Get to it."

The classroom grew silent as everyone began looking through the holographic pages of their books. Jim was halfway through reading the first paragraph when he thought he heard someone calling his name.

"Jim?" the voice called.

Jim looked around the room, but could not see who the voice belonged to.

"Jim?" the voice called again.

* * *

><p>"Jim, are you listening to me?"<p>

Jim snapped back to reality, shaking the memories of his old life out of his mind. He was laying down on a long couch in the middle of a medium sized room. In the armchair across from him sat a gray-furred Vulpid dressed in a navy blue suit, Doctor Justev Rosson; his psychiatrist.

Jim sighed deeply. "Sorry, doc," he said. "I zoned out again. What did you say?"

"You said you were having nightmares again," Doctor Rosson said. "I was asking what they were about."

Jim sighed again and looked out the window across from the foot of his couch. Hundreds of droplets of water were rolling down the glass as a torrential downpour of rain drenched the city outside. The occasional fork of lightning would illuminate the room for a short moment before sending it back into its original dim lighting. But Jim knew that this was all an illusion, and that what really laid beyond the window was the mid-afternoon sun casting its incandescent orange glow over the capital city of Vulpes.

Ever since he started making weekly visits to a therapist to help him with his post traumatic stress disorder, he had requested that his sessions be held in a room fitted with holo-projectors and speaker units to simulate being inside during a rainstorm. Jim didn't know why, but for some reason he found watching the rain to be soothing. The sight and sound always made him feel more relaxed for a reason he couldn't explain. And that helped a lot when it came to talking about the day that had haunted him for the last five years.

"The nightmares," Jim started. "They were about my mother. They were just like the day she was killed. She was stuck under the wreckage of our home, and all I could do was watch as she was beheaded."

"And the person beheading her was Emperor Garek?" Doctor Rosson asked.

Jim nodded silently in response.

"And was it the same dream each night?"

"Yes," Jim sighed. "There have been several times in the last few months where I thought I was finished with them, but they keep on coming back. It's like their haunting me."

"You've been through a horrible ordeal, Jim," Rosson said. "And it's left you with some serious mental scars. Those scars are going to take a very long time to heal."

Jim turned his head to look at the gray-furred Vulpid. "It's been five years, doc," he said. "How much longer do I have to suppress these memories before I can finally sleep at night?"

Rosson waited a few seconds before saying, "I don't know if I can answer that. PTSD never really goes away, the best you can do is manage it. But if we keep going with your psychotherapy treatments, then your nightmares should go away in time,"

Jim only nodded silently. He didn't want to express his doubt in what Doctor Rosson had told him. He had been seeing him on a weekly basis off and on for almost five years, and he was still haunted by what happened in Korran's Hope. At this point, he was pretty much certain that therapy wasn't even helping.

Rosson looked over to the holographic clock mounted on the wall near the door. "I think it's about time I let you go," he said. He then hit a switch on the end table beside his chair and the simulated rain storm came to an end.

Jim sighed and stood up from the couch. "Alright. I guess I'll see you next week, doc," he said.

Rosson gave him a friendly smile. "Just hang in there, Jim. We'll get you sorted out sooner or later,"

"Yeah, I hope so," Jim quietly mumbled as he stepped out of the room and made his way out of the building.

* * *

><p>As he stepped out of the building, Jim took a moment to take in the view of the cityscape of Vulpes's capital city. Built up over the course of thousands of years, the city of Kelloraan was a sprawling mass of towering skyscrapers. Unlike Korran's Hope back on Forge, Kelloraan wasn't divided up into districts. Instead, the city was split up into different altitude levels. There were ten levels in all, each one extending upward for half a kilometer. While the lower levels of the city were vastly made up of manufactories and low-class housing and businesses, the higher levels were home to the middle- and upper-class apartments and offices. Essentially, the higher you go in Kelloraan, the nicer (and more expensive) things are. Right now, Jim was standing on level six.<p>

He made his way to the nearly deserted landing pad outside the building and climbed into his sleek, red airspeeder. A few seconds later, the vehicle's repulsorlift engines hummed to life and he was airborne, making his way back to the McCloud's residence on level five.

His ride home was a silent one, listening only to the hum of the speeder's engines at work as he piloted the vehicle. He never listened to the radio anymore, none of the stations ever played anything decent. The only station worth listening to was the Galactic News Broadcast (GNB), and he didn't even want to listen to that. In recent years, just about every news story he had heard on the GNB was about some atrocity that the Empire had committed. Imperial prisoners being forced to work in slave labor camps; Black Guard units executing protesters on Loria; the Imperial Navy bombing the jungle world of Syllaco, reducing the entire planet to a molten, lifeless rock. Just hearing about the atrocities that the Empire was getting away with made him sick. And the worst part was that he knew there was nothing he could do about it, and that the Empire would continue to go on unpunished. All he could do was hope that they would stay away from Vulpes.

A few minutes later, Jim reached the public landing pad across from the apartment complex where he lived. He set down, climbed out of the speeder and started the short walk over to the complex. At this hour, the streets were fairly packed. While Forge's population was a melting pot of various species, the population of Vulpes was almost exclusively Vulpid. As far as Jim knew, he was the only human living on the entire planet. But, much to his own relief, nobody paid any mind to him as he made his way across the suspended walkways of Kelloraan's fifth level.

Jim reached the apartment building and walked inside. He made his way through the lobby and down a long, door lined hallway, only stopping once he reached the door to the McCloud's apartment. He pressed the door's "open" button and walked inside. The door slid shut behind him.

In the living room, Fox shifted in his position on the couch to see the white-haired human step into the apartment. "Oh, hey, you're back," the tan Vulpid greeted.

"Hey, man," Jim said as he took a look around the open-floored apartment. "Are Vixy and James here?"

Fox shook his head. "Nah, they went out somewhere a little while ago," he said.

"Do you know where they went?"

"Nope. I wasn't really paying attention when Mom said they were going out,"

"Okay. Well, I'm gonna take a nap," Jim said.

Fox nodded. "Yeah, you look like you could use one," he said.

Jim sighed. "You don't know the half of it, Fox," he said as he stepped out of the living room and made his way to his bedroom.

Once in his room, Jim kicked off his boots and removed his shirt before crawling into his bed. He hadn't gotten a full night of sleep in almost a week. Needless to say, he was dead tired. And once he was in the comfortable confines of his bed, it didn't take long for him to drift off to sleep.

* * *

><p>Jim knew he was dreaming. Only this wasn't the dream that he usually saw. He wasn't re-witnessing the death of his mother. Instead, he was standing alone in a...<p>

He didn't know know _where_ he was. The silvery floor beneath him, although solid, seemed to ripple like water. A thick fog enveloped the space around him, restricting his vision to only a few inches. He started to walk forward, taking a look around the mysterious dream world he now inhabited.

"You're so much like your father," a familiar soft, feminine voice whispered, breaking the dream's uncanny silence.

Jim stopped in his tracks, his eyes wide in surprise. He frantically looked around the foggy world around him, trying to see where the voice had come from.

"I wish he were here now. He would be so proud of you," the voice whispered again.

Jim had heard the words before, spoken to him by someone who was now long dead. "Mom?" he called out.

Suddenly, the fog in front of him parted. The figure of a black-haired woman dressed in a white gown stood three meters away from him. He recognized the form of his mother instantly.

"Mom," Jim said, his voice cracking slightly.

His mother looked up at him and gave him a soft smile. "My darling boy," she said. "I've missed you so much."

Jim walked up to her, arms extended and ready to wrap her in a loving embrace. But instead of making contact with her, she simply phased through his arms, subsequently vanishing without a trace.

Jim's heart sank and he collapsed to his knees.

"He's waiting for you," his mother's voice whispered to him. "Go to him, my son."

Jim looked up, tears starting to form in his eyes. "Mom," he said quietly. "Don't go,"

Fog enveloped him again, and his mother no longer spoke to him. Once again, he was alone in the dream world, left to contemplate what he had heard. Somebody was waiting for him. But who? And where were they?

"Jim," a second voice called, this one belonging to a man. "Come on, boy, wake up."

* * *

><p>Jim's eyes slowly opened as he returned to reality. With a tired groan, he rolled over in his bed to see the form of James McCloud standing over him.<p>

"Come on, wake up," James said.

In response, Jim just rolled back over and closed his eyes again. But James wasn't having any of that. He grabbed onto the human's covers with both hands and violently yanked them from the bed.

Jim yelped in surprise and sat up in his bed. "What the fuck!?" he exclaimed.

There was no trace of humor on James's face. He was completely stern. "I'm serious," the Vulpid said. "Get out of bed and put a shirt on."

Jim sat up straighter and saw someone else standing beside James. It took him a second to recognize his childhood friend. "Fara?" he asked. "What are you doing here?"

"This concerns her, too," James answered for her.

"What are you talking about? What the hell is going on?" Jim asked.

"I'll explain it later," James said irritably. "Now get out of bed." With that, the Vulpid turned and stepped out of the bedroom, Fara walking out with him.

"God dammit," Jim grumbled to himself as he got out of bed and walked over to his dresser. He took a quick look inside, pulled out a blue, sleeveless shirt and pulled it on over his head. He then put his black leather boots back on and walked out of his room after James and Fara.

"James, what's going on?" Jim asked as he walked into the living room, where James, Fara and Fox had congregated.

"We're heading to the _Outrider_," James said. "We're going off-world for a bit,"

Fox cast Jim a confused glance and simply shrugged.

"Come on, we're leaving," James said as he opened the apartment door and stepped out, Fara and Fox following him. Jim just sighed in defeat and walked out after them.

* * *

><p>Half an hour later, the <em>Outrider<em> had taken off from the level five starpad and had left Vulpes's atmosphere. Once they broke orbit, Jim walked out of the ship's common room, where Fox and Fara were, and made his way up to the cockpit. He sat down in the copilot's seat next to James.

"Care to explain what's going on?" the snowy-haired human asked. "Why is Fara here? Why isn't Vixy coming with us?"

"Vixy opted to stay behind," James said. "And Fara's here for the same reason you are."

Jim arched an eyebrow at his adopted father. "And what reason is that?" he asked.

"You'll see once we reach our destination," James answered.

Jim sighed and leaned back in his seat. "It would be fantastic if you would stop being so vague," he grumbled.

"Trust me," James started. "If I told you what was going on, you wouldn't believe me. This is something you just need to see for yourself."

Jim rolled his eyes and looked out at the starfield outside the main viewport. "Can you at least tell me where we're going?" he asked.

"Aeos," James said. "A small planet in the Mid-Rim."

"Never heard of it," Jim said.

"That doesn't surprise me. Not very many people know about it. It hasn't shown up on modern starmaps for a couple of centuries,"

Jim turned to face the middle-aged Vulpid. "How do you know about it, then?"

"An old friend of mine," James said.

Jim just left it at that, knowing that any further attempt to get an answer as to what they were doing was futile. A few seconds later, James finished punching in a set of coordinates into the ship's navigation console and the _Outrider_ was propelled into warp-space. Jim leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, hoping that he would get some sleep during the journey. He was just going to have to wait to see what awaited him on Aeos.

"_He's waiting for you,_" the words that the vision of his mother spoke to him in his dream echoed in his head. "_Go to him, my son,_"

"_What does that mean?_" he asked mentally. "_Who's waiting for me?_"

* * *

><p>Two hours passed in silence in the <em>Outrider<em>'s cockpit. The navigation console beeped rapidly, signaling that they were nearing their destination. James hit a series of controls and the spinning, blue tunnel of warp-space snapped back to the endless starfield of real-space. Outside of the main viewport was a planetary system; one world, two moons. The planet itself looked completely overgrown. Its vast forests and grassy plains made the world stand out as a large, green orb against the star-dusted black.

"Aeos," James said to himself. "It's been a long time." He took hold of the ship's control yoke and sent it flying along a course towards the planet's surface. He continued along that same course even after entering the planet's atmosphere.

For the next ten minutes, the _Outrider _soared over the dense forests of Aeos until it reached a clearing outside of a large, stone structure. The building was an ancient thing, probably millennia old, and judging by its weathered and ruined state, it had clearly seen quite a bit of action. The entire outside of the building was overgrown with thick vines growing all across the architecture, as well as several other types of flora.

James started up the _Outrider_'s landing cycle and set the ship down just outside the large structure. Once he powered down the engines, he nudged the young human sleeping next to him in the copilot's seat.

Jim opened his eyes and looked over to his adopted father. "What?" he asked groggily.

"We're here," James said as he stood up from his seat. "Come with me."

Jim just nodded and and stood up from his chair, following the Vulpid out of the cockpit and off the ship's loading ramp. When they were outside, Jim looked up in awe at the massive, stone structure. "What is this place?" he asked.

"The only building on Aeos," James replied. "You'll learn more when we get inside."

"Are Fox and Fara gonna come with us?"

"Not right now. What we're about to do is for you alone,"

Jim sighed and kept on walking towards the structure, making his way up the large, cracked stair case and into the single, massive opening at the front of the building. That opening led into a grand hallway. Left and Right of the entrance were two staircases that led up to the second level, which overlooked the entrance from a balcony-like landing. The rest of the main hallway was lined with side passages that led to countless other chambers, all lit by small lamps built into the walls that gave off a soft, blue light.

James led Jim up one of the two staircases to the second level, where they came across a large, sealed door.

"Okay," Jim said uneasily. "Now what?"

James simply stepped towards the door and pounded a fist against it three times. "Alex!" he bellowed. "It's McCloud! Open the door, old man!"

A few seconds later, the door swung inward, revealing the man standing on the other side. A tall human male, probably in his mid to late fifties, dressed entirely in a set of black robes. He had long, jet-black hair and bright blue eyes. And once he saw James, his eyes widened.

"Jesus Christ, it really is you," he said as he stepped closer to the Vulpid. "And here I was thinking that I had finally lost my mind."

James smiled at him. "Well, it's good to see that you're still kicking, old friend," he said as he wrapped his arms around the man in a friendly embrace. "It's been too long."

"Indeed," the man said as the two came apart. "It's been, what, nineteen years?"

"Um, anybody wanna fill me in, here?" Jim finally piped up. The man looked at him and his jaw dropped.

"My God," he whispered as he stepped towards the white-haired human.

Once he was close enough, his gaze caught the blue crystal pendant fastened around the young man's neck. Jim noticed this and took hold of the pendant in one of his hands. "You looking at this?" he asked. "I've had this all my life. It's a family heirloom."

"I know it is," the man said. "I remember giving it to you."

Jim cocked an eyebrow. "What are you talking about?" he asked.

James cleared his throat. "I think it's time you two were properly introduced," he said. "Jim, this man is an old friend of mine. This is Alexander Kolyat, your father."


	4. 4: Auran

**AUTHOR'S NOTES: Surprise! I'm not dead! And with this new chapter comes some news regarding the state of my other story, Civil War. I know that I said I would end up finishing it, but I'm just not feeling it anymore. I really do hate going back on my word, but I'm afraid it's looking like Civil War isn't going to be completed. Now, whether or not I'm going to delete it, that's for you guys to decide. I'm putting up a poll that will close at the end of the week. Depending on what the majority vote is, I'll either keep the story up, or take it down. And if nobody votes, then I'll leave it up to a coin-toss. But now, with that out of the way, I hope you enjoy this chapter.**

**UPDATE: I re-read the last few bits of dialogue. Didn't like it. Went back and re-wrote it. Hope I don't have to do this again.**

CHAPTER 4

Auran

"You're lying," Jim said, shaking off the shock of what he'd been told. "My dad is dead. You told me yourself, James."

The black-robed man, Alexander, placed a hand on Jim's shoulder and looked him in the eyes. "He's telling you the truth, son," he said. "I really am your father."

Jim glared at him, grasped the man's wrist and violently pushed his hand off of his shoulder. "If you were my father," he started in a venomous tone. "then you would have stayed with me and Mom. You wouldn't have run off to do what ever the hell you've been doing for the last nineteen years!"

James looked to Jim, completely appalled. "Jim, I thought you'd be happy to-"

"Happy to do what?" Jim asked, turning his glare to the Vulpid. "Happy to find out that you've been lying to me for my entire life?"

James was completely stunned. He kept on opening and closing his mouth, trying to find the right words to say. After a few seconds, Alexander spoke.

"James, I think you should go back to your ship for now," he said. "We need some time alone."

"R-right," James stuttered before turning, making his way downstairs and stepping out of the building.

Once they were alone, Alexander spoke again. "You have the right to be angry," he said softly. "But please, just understand that I left to protect you and your mother. If I had stayed with you on Forge, I would have jeopardized everything."

"Yeah? Well, guess what," Jim countered. "The Empire sacked Forge anyways, turned Korran's Hope into a graveyard. And then, they had to go the extra mile and-"

"The Inquisition found her," Alexander said solemnly. "Garek killed your mother, I know."

Jim's jaw dropped slightly and his eyes widened. "You know?"

"Walk with me," Alexander said. "I'll explain everything."

The man turned and walked back through the door he had opened up. Jim hesitated for a few seconds before he followed him, trotting up from behind to walk alongside him.

After a moment of awkward silence, Jim finally spoke up. "How would you have jeopardized Mom and I if you stayed?" he asked.

"Because I'm a marked man," Alexander answered simply. "Have you ever heard of Directive Twenty-two Fifty-seven?"

Jim nodded. "It was a Federation security directive," he answered. "It was issued the day that the Empire rose to power. It was what brought about the founding of the Inquisition."

"And it destroyed the Auran Order," Alexander added.

Jim stopped in his tracks, arching an eyebrow confusedly. "The what?"

Alexander turned to face the young man. "The Order of Auran Knights," he said. "The brotherhood of warrior-scholars that defended the Galactic Federation."

"I've never heard of it,"

"That's because the Empire erased everything regarding its existence from public archives. The only people who remember the Order are those with living memory of the Unification War, or those who survived Twenty-two Fifty-seven,"

"So, you're marked because...?"

"Because I'm one of the last Knights in the galaxy," Alexander said. "There's only a handful of us left, clinging to life wherever we can find solace from the Empire. Those that weren't killed by the Black Guard years ago are now being mercilessly hunted by the Inquisition."

There was a pause as Jim thought of his next question. "Was Mom a Knight?" he asked.

Alexander nodded. "Yes,"

"Then how come she wasn't marked? Why wasn't the Empire hunting her?"

"Because the Empire thought she was already dead," Alexander explained. "Your mother and I both served as generals during the Unification War. Once Directive Twenty-two Fifty-seven was put into action, our Black Guard units turned on us. While I fought back against my unit, your mother faked her own death when her men betrayed her."

"So that's why she fled to the Outer Rim," Jim said. "Because she knew that the Empire would recognize her if she stayed in Imperial space."

Alexander nodded. "And that's why I didn't come with her," he said. "That's why I've been hiding here for the last nineteen years."

"What exactly is this place, anyways?" Jim asked.

"This temple is the birthplace of the Auran Order," Alexander answered. "For thousands of years, every Knight called this temple home. But when Corneria became the capital world of the Federation, the Order relocated, constructing a new temple in the heart of the Cornerian capital. Only now, with the Empire in control of everything, the temple on Corneria is nothing more than a graveyard. And this temple lies forgotten."

There was another pause as Jim took in everything he had been told. So far, Alexander had answered every question he had. He knew why Forge was invaded; the Inquisition found fugitive Knights living there. He knew why his father had left; the Empire had marked him for death. He knew why his mother was murdered in front of him by none other than the Emperor himself; she was an Auran Knight in hiding. But there was one thing that he didn't understand.

"What exactly is an Auran?" Jim asked. "What makes them so special that the Empire wants all of them dead?"

Alexander took a few steps closer to the young, white-haired man. "An Auran is somebody who's born with incredible powers," he started. "Somebody who can make a difference in the galaxy," He placed a hand on Jim's shoulder. "And you're one of the most powerful ones I have ever met."

"So, what does this mean for me?"

"It means that you have a choice," Alexander said. "If you want to take down the Empire, then you're going to need the training I can offer you. You can stay here, stay with me, and I can teach you how to control your powers. Or, if you think that fighting the Empire is a suicide mission, you can go back out to McCloud's ship and go home, pretend none of this ever happened and extinguish the last beacon of hope that the galaxy has."

The dream that Jim had before coming here finally made sense. It wasn't just a meaningless projection like other dreams were, it actually meant something. The person his mother told him to go to, she was talking about his father. His father had been waiting for him for nineteen years so he could give him this offer. This is what his mother had wanted for him, and he wasn't about to disrespect the memory of his mother.

"The Empire took Mom from me," he said after a few seconds. "They destroyed my home and ripped apart my family," he looked up, locking his eyes with Alexander's. "If I really am what you say I am, then I want you to train me. I want you to teach me to be a Knight."

Alexander smiled. "I thought you might say that," he said. "Very well, son. Your training starts tomorrow."

"Just one last question," Jim said. "James had us bring along a friend of mine, Fara Phoenix. He said that whatever was here concerned her as well. Do you know what he meant by that?"

Alexander's eyes widened. "Phoenix?" he asked. "Kaidan Phoenix had a daughter?"

"Let me guess," Jim said. "Fara's dad was an Auran?"

The dark-haired man nodded in response. "Yes,"

"So that means that she's an Auran, too?"

"Possibly. Here's hoping that I can teach two students at once,"

* * *

><p>Several minutes later, James, Fox and Fara had joined Jim and Alexander within the spacious, stone confines of the temple. Alexander had explained to them everything that he told Jim and, after discovering that Fara was indeed an Auran, showed them to the living chambers of the temple's east wing.<p>

The chambers of the east wing consisted of a series of moderately sized rooms, each one identically furnished. Three beds lined along the wall on the right-hand side, a footlocker at the foot of each bed, a small dining table on the left-hand side of the room, what appeared to be an archaic version of a holo-projector in the center, and a sliding metal door that led into a bathroom. Despite the temple being centuries old, everything seemed maintained and well cared for, thanks to Alexander looking after the temple for the last nineteen years.

Jim, Fox and Fara were given one room in the center of the wing to share. Alexander and James claimed another room several doors down the hall.

"Well, guess this place is home for a while," Fox said as he sat down on the bed nearest to the door. "At least the rooms are decent. Better than what we have aboard the _Outrider_."

Jim nodded in agreement. "Yeah, we could have done worse," he said. He turned his gaze to the Fennec Vulpid standing beside him. "You okay, Fara? You've been really quiet ever since we left Vulpes."

Fara sighed and took a seat on one of the chairs at the dining table. "I'm fine," she said. Jim wasn't convinced, though.

"Come on, we've been your friends since the start," Fox said. "If something's bothering you, you can tell us."

Fara sighed. "It's just ... I'm having trouble taking all of this in," she said. She turned her gaze to Jim. "I've never even heard of an Auran until today, and it turns out that you and I are both Aurans. And my dad ..." she paused for a few seconds. "my dad never told me he was a Knight. He never told me a thing. At least now I know why the Empire killed him."

Jim felt a sharp pang of sympathy at that last part. Fara's father had been murdered by the Empire during the invasion of Forge. But not only did she never get to say goodbye to him, she never even got to _see_ him before the invasion.

Jim sat down next to her and sighed. "I'm sorry," he said softly. "I never said anything to you after your dad died. At least I actually got to see my mom before she was killed."

"Jim, don't act like I had it worse than you," Fara said. "You saw your mom get decapitated. I was spared having to see whatever the Imps did to my dad."

Jim didn't say anything in response. He knew she was right. Those few moments where he saw his mother get beheaded were the worst moments of his life, and they had left him with some serious mental scars that he wasn't sure he would ever recover from.

"You guys both have it really shitty," Fox said. "Nobody should have to go through what you guys have gone through."

Jim looked over to Fox and smirked. "It's all in the past, anyways," he said. "If all we do is dwell on the past, then we'll never accomplish anything for the future."

Fox returned his smirk. "Since when were you a philosopher?"

Jim shrugged. "Since just now, apparently,"

"So, you're serious about fighting the Empire?" Fox asked.

"Dead serious," Jim replied, removing any trace of humor from his face. "They've gone on too long without punishment for their injustices. And if Fara and I really are Aurans like Alexander said, then we can take the fight to them."

Fox leaned forward and sighed. "It seems like suicide," he mumbled. "But your mom was family to me," He looked back up at Jim and smirked again. "Nobody fucks with my family. I'm with you all the way."

"So am I," Fara said.

Jim smiled and nodded. "Rebellion it is, then,"

The other two nodded as well. "Rebellion it is," they echoed in unison.

* * *

><p>Jim slept surprisingly well that night. Not a single nightmare ripping him out of his slumber or a single person rousing him awake. That is, not until around five o'clock when he felt his bed's covers being ripped off of him. Startled, Jim sat up straight in his bed and looked to see who had awoken him. Alexander was standing over him.<p>

"Wake up," he said bluntly. "And put these on," he added as he placed a set of folded clothes at the foot of Jim's bed. "Fara's waiting for us in the main hall. Head there when you're dressed." With that, Alexander turned and made his way out of the room.

Jim groaned and wiped the sleep away from his eyes as he stood up from the bed and looked over the clothes that Alexander had provided him. It was a very simple outfit, consisting of a sleeveless white tunic and a pair of gray pants. He quickly donned the outfit and put on his own black leather boots before leaving the room.

Alexander and Fara were waiting for him in the temple's main hall. Fara, dressed in the same outfit as him, gave him a friendly smile when she saw him. "You look nice. That outfit suits you," she said. "Sleep well?"

"Well enough," Jim replied. "Could've used a couple more hours, though."

"Now that you're up and about," Alexander said. "we can get started. Are you two ready?"

Jim and Fara both nodded.

"Follow me, then,"

Alexander led the two into a large, circular room in the temple's west wing. The room's solid white walls went up seven meters to the curved, dome-like ceiling. Protruding from the walls were several glass pods, containing what seemed to be inactive training droids of some sort.

"The first step to achieving full mastery your powers is learning to use your sixth sense," Alexander said as he stepped towards the center of the room. "Your sixth sense, while it is the most basic of your abilities, is one of the most important ones you posses. With practice, you will have nearly omnipresent awareness of your surroundings. Now, let's get started. Sit down, close your eyes and clear your minds."

Jim and Fara complied, sitting cross-legged on the floor and closing their eyes tightly. As far as 'clearing his mind' went, Jim had no idea what he was meant to do. First, he simply tried thinking of nothing. But, after about thirty seconds, he felt he wasn't doing something right. He couldn't sense what was happening around him. He couldn't sense anything.

"I don't get it," Jim said after a couple of minutes. "How am I supposed to go about doing this? What does it even mean to 'clear your mind'?"

"Focus," Alexander said. "Focus on your surroundings."

Jim's eyes snapped open. "How am I supposed to focus on my surroundings when you're having me do this with my eyes closed?" he asked irritably.

"Your eyes can deceive you, don't trust them," Alexander answered. "Focus only on the room around you."

Jim sighed and closed his eyes again. "_I can quote Star Wars too, old man,_" he thought to himself. "_I wonder if Fara is having as much trouble as I am,_" He pushed his irritated thoughts out of his head. If he was going to make any progress here, he just had to follow Alexander's pointers. He took his focus away from everything else. The only thing that mattered was the room he was sitting in. Nothing else mattered. Some time passed and, once again, he felt like he wasn't making any progress. He focused as hard as he could on the room he was in, trying to visualize it in his head. The circular structure, the white-plated walls that curved upward to form the dome-like ceiling, Alexander standing in the center, Fara sitting to the right of him, the sliding door to the main hall behind him-

"_Holy shit,_" he thought to himself. "_I think I just did it!_" It was almost as if he could see the room completely unobscured. But it didn't end there. He felt ... something coming from Alexander and Fara. Like he could sense what they were feeling. He could feel waves of what he guessed were frustration coming from Fara. She must have still been struggling to set her focus right. And then he felt something else. It felt like the back of his skull was tingling. Almost as if his senses were trying to tell him something. Like they were warning him to-

Without wasting a second, Jim straightened out his legs and dove to the left-hand side of the room, rolling to his feet as a cyan blaster bolt exploded against the wall directly behind where he was sitting, leaving a black blast point on the smooth white surface. Fara's ears perked up and her eyes snapped open. A small gasp escaped from her mouth as she looked towards the source of the noise.

Jim looked over to her and then to Alexander. The black-haired man was holding a pistol in his right hand, the barrel still smoking.

"Are you insane?!" Jim yelled. "You could have killed me!"

Alexander holstered the pistol and looked to the young man. "It was set to stun. All it would have done was knock you out for a while,"

"Then what was the gun for?" Jim asked.

"It was part of the lesson," Alexander explained. "You'll find that your sixth sense will warn you about impending threats. You may recall a tingling sensation in the back of your skull moments before I fired the gun. That was your sixth sense warning you."

Jim stood up straight. "So, did I pass then?" he asked, dropping his irritated tone.

Alexander nodded. "You learn very quickly. That's a good sign. Great job today," The man turned his gaze to Fara. "On the other hand, I could sense you struggling to attune your senses. We need to work on that more today. Jim, you can return to your room, get those extra hours of sleep you wanted. You've earned them."


End file.
